“Really?”
“The only registered signatories for Fethering Yacht Club cheques are the Commodore, the Vice-Commodore and the Treasurer. Well, the Commodore has been abroad for the last four months, during which time most of the cheques were drawn. I can assure you I haven’t been putting my hand in the till – might have helped me out a bit if I had, but I haven’t. So that leaves the Treasurer.”
He paused for dramatic effect, and was visibly miffed when Carole came in impatiently and upstaged him. “Who is, of course, Rory Turnbull.”
“Yes,” a tight-lipped Denis Woodville conceded. “So that might give him one reason for doing away with himself. He knew I was meeting the accountants yesterday. I imagine he just didn’t want to face the music.”
“So he got into his BMW,” led Crisp speculated, “drove up into the Downs, fixed a tube from the exhaust into the car’s interior – ”
“We don’t know that’s what happened, do we?” asked Jude. “The police didn’t say they’d found him, did they?”
“No,” the landlord agreed. “But from what they were saying, it’s pretty clear that’s what they were expecting to find.”
“But why would he have done it?” demanded Carole. “Put his hand in the Yacht Club till? For a thousand pounds? I mean, a thousand pounds would be very nice – none of us would say no to it…”
“Certainly not.” Denis Woodville’s agreement was heartfelt.
“…but for someone in Rory Turribull’s position – dentist’s salary, big house on the Shorelands Estate – a thousand pounds isn’t much. Certainly not enough for him to risk public humiliation and possible criminal proceedings. Why would he have done it?”
“You’d be amazed!” Ted Crisp shook his shaggy head at the recurrent follies of humankind. “Happens all the time – particularly in a place like Fethering. Somebody gets a position of power locally – only in the Cricket Club or the Yacht Club or something tinpot like that” – he went on, apparently unaware of the Vice-Commodore’s bristling – “and they have access to another chequebook, and they suddenly think, “Ooh, I can get something out of this.” And they milk the funds. Just for the odd hundred they’ll do it. I don’t know why, but it certainly keeps happening.”
“I suppose everyone needs money,” Carole concluded. “People may look like they’ve got plenty, but we can’t see inside their bank accounts, can we? We can’t know what demands there are on their resources, what foolish investments they may have made, what reckless loans they’ve taken on. It’s one of the last taboos in this country, people actually talking about their financial affairs.”
“You’re right.” Ted Crisp looked at their glasses. “Come on, let’s have another drink. This round’s on me.”
“That’s no way to make a profit,” Carole observed.
The landlord turned on her in mock anger. “Are you saying no? Are you saying you don’t want to take a drink from me?”
She smiled graciously. “No, I’m not. Thank you very much indeed, Ted.”
As she pushed her wine glass forward, she felt another little frisson from the knowledge that she, Carole Seddon, was in the Crown and Anchor, exchanging banter with the landlord and calling him by his first name. She’d come a long way in a week.
“Of course, people develop expensive habits too,” Ted ruminated, as he poured the drinks. “Rory Turn-bull was getting through the Scotch in here like there was no tomorrow.”
“But on his income presumably he could afford an alcohol habit.”
“He could afford an alcohol habit, yes, Carole.”
She was quickly on to the slight pressure he’d put on the word. “What do you mean? Are you saying he had another expensive habit? Are you saying Rory Turnbull was into drugs?”
But either Carole had mistaken his intonation or the landlord had decided he didn’t wish to amplify the hint. He just said, “Hardly. Don’t somehow see him in the role of crazed junkie, do you?” He punctuated the end of such speculation by plonking the two replenished wine glasses on the counter. “There you are – compliments of the management. Treasure this moment. Record it on the mental video cameras of your minds. Because I can assure you, it doesn’t happen very often!”
When the round of thank-yous had subsided, Jude looked thoughtful. “It’s odd, though, isn’t it? Two suicides in a week…”
“Two?” asked the Vice-Commodore.
“That boy Aaron Spalding.”
“Was that suicide?”
Jude caught Carole’s eye and read caution in it. What they had been investigating was private, between the two of them, at least for the time being.
“Well, that’s certainly been suggested,” said Jude, making her tone more generalized. “I don’t know whether there’s been an inquest yet. OK, not two suicides – two unnatural deaths. All I’m saying is that for someone like me, who’s lived here less than a week, that seems rather a high number. Or is it the usual pattern in Fethering?”
“By no means,” Denis Woodville replied. “There’s probably a higher death rate here than in most other parts of the country, but that’s simply because of the average age of the residents. Two unnatural deaths like this is most unusual.”
Jude’s brown eyes signalled to Carole not to worry, she was only floating an idea to see if it got any response, before she asked ingenuously, “Makes one wonder whether there could be any connection between the two.”
The suggestion produced a snort of laughter from the Vice-Commodore. “A connection between a highly respected middle-aged man living on the Shorelands Estate and some teenager from Downside? I would think not.”
“No,” said Jude.
“Hardly,” said Carole.
But they were both increasingly convinced that there was a connection.
There was the clatter of the bar door opening and a voice said, “Evening, mine host.”
Bill Chilcott had arrived for his nightly half.
Denis Woodville stiffened and downed the remainder of the brandy Ted Crisp had bought him. “Sorry, I must be off,” he said. “Suddenly a rather nasty smell around this place.”
And, as if his next-door neighbour didn’t exist, the Vice-Commodore stalked out of the Crown and Anchor.
? The Body on the Beach ?
Twenty-Six
“It was in Rory Turribull’s boat,” said Carole, as they reached the gate of Woodside Cottage. The evening was mild. The frost would probably hold off that night. “The body was put in
“It’s not much,” said Jude.
Carole sighed despondently. “Maybe there is no connection. Maybe it’s just an unfortunate coincidence.”
Jude shook her head. “No, there’s a link between them. They are connected.”
So strong was the conviction in her voice that Carole didn’t argue. Instead, characteristically, she moved on to practicalities. “Well, I think we need to know more about Rory Turnbull. What he was like, what was happening in his life, what pushed him over the edge.”
“And whether he did have anything to do with drugs.”
“You noticed that too? When Ted hinted at something and then clammed up?”
“Oh yes. I’ll follow up on the drugs thing tomorrow.”
“How?”
